Woodturning a rosary with a wooden cross and beads

 

Tools and materials I propose:

Lathe

Wood turning tools set

Bandsaw

Chuck kit

Tormek T8 Sharpening System

Tormek BGM-100 Bench Grinder Mounting Set

Tormek Woodturner’s Kit

Diamond Grinding Wheel Dresser

In this video I make a wooden rosary. I turned the cross out of iroko wood. The beads are made out of ebony and iroko.

First of all I installed the zero clearance insert on my table saw. I had to deal with really small pieces so that was a must. 

After cutting my stock to size I created the half lap joint of the cross. 

I then glued the pieces together. I started turning the cross. This was mostly skew work. Once I finished the first side I remounted the piece to do the other. 

I then blended everything using a flat sanding block. 

To make the beads I had to make a special tool to make my life easier. I first used my diamond stone flattening tool to roundover the wheel of my grinder. Then I made a beading tool using an old chisel. I kept dipping the tip in water to cool it down. 

Then I started making my beads. I first established the size using the beading tool. Then I used a parting tool to remove material form the sides of the beads. Then I used the beading tool again to shape the bead. I then drilled the hole and cut off the bead with a saw. 

I sanded the beads on the lathe using a disc sanding attachment. 

I finished all the pieces by dipping them in mineral oil.

Then I connected all the pieces with a leather string.

And my rosary was ready. It was a pretty interesting woodturning project, but that was it. See you soon with a new project video. 

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